We have been besieged, Kalkator thought. And our citadels have fallen. The bitterness of the reality filled him with frustrated violence. Had there been a serf within reach, he would have torn the mortal apart just to see the blood.
The Thunderhawk was on the final approach to the Palimodes when the end came to the Scythe of Schravaan. Kalkator didn’t see what caused the fatal blow. It happened on the ship’s starboard, which faced towards the moon. Searing white lit the void. It engulfed the Schravaan’s midsection, a fist of suns. The bow and stern began to move independently, and the light faded, resolving into a halo of individual explosions. A gap formed between the fore and aft halves of the ship before the bow began a spiral away from the stern. The movement was slow, graceful. The lights of the void shields went dark. In their place, lines of flames, the angry red of infected veins, raced down the bow’s length as it fell towards Klostra’s atmosphere.
The reactor blew, a second wound of light in the void. The reach of the blast was enormous, wiping the near space clean of ork fighters. That death-cry bought the Palimodes a bit more time. Kalkator dared to think a portion of the Great Company might extract itself from the system. The loss wouldn’t be total.
Then he watched the Schravaan’s bow become a torch as it hit Klostra’s atmosphere, and he thought he could hear the laughter of the orks even here.
The Palimodes’ engines were going hot as the Thunderhawk docked. Attonax had ordered the run. The ship was racing to the system’s Mandeville point when Kalkator walked onto the bridge. He joined Attonax at the command throne. The other Iron Warrior nodded to him and vacated the throne.
‘The ship is yours, warsmith,’ he said.
For as long as we have one, Kalkator thought. The first rocket hits were beginning. The rear shields were holding strong, though, and the Palimodes was picking up speed. ‘Set course for the Ostrom System,’ he said.
‘We can’t,’ Attonax told him. ‘We’ve lost it too.’
‘What?’
‘That’s why we returned.’ His face was a patchwork of metal and flesh, iron replacing the mutations excavated from his skull. Expression was difficult. His bitterness was profound, for it to be so apparent. ‘We were retreating.’
‘The orks hit us there too?’
‘No. The Black Templars.’
The Great Company was caught between two fronts. Kalkator’s forces had lost their holdings. He grimaced.
‘Get us to the point and make the jump,’ he ordered.
‘Where to?’ Attonax asked.
Kalkator didn’t answer. He watched the strategium screens, noting the damage reports as they came in, measuring them against what he knew the ship could take; tallying still more casualties, still more strength leeched from his command.
The deck vibrated: rocket hits overwhelming the void shields. The sensorium array registered ork torpedo ships in pursuit. The Palimodes accelerated. The Mandeville point drew closer.
‘Our integrity…’ Attonax began.
‘Will be enough,’ Kalkator finished. ‘If we’re breathing, we jump.’
The other Iron Warrior nodded. If the ship died, it would not be in the sight of the orks.
The moment of the transition came. The writhe of the warp appeared on the primary oculus. The Palimodes was racing through nothing to nowhere.
‘The Navigator will need a destination,’ Attonax said.
‘I’m aware of that.’ He stared at the violence of colliding absences and clawed potential. ‘We can’t fight them both,’ he said.
There was a long silence. At last, Attonax asked, ‘What are you saying?’
‘That we can’t fight them both.’
Thirteen
Juskina Tull had a view of the Fields of Winged Victory from her quarters. The armourglass window stretched across the entire width of the reception chamber. The room was the largest of her suite, occupying half of the top floor of the Pharos Tower. The size was not an indulgence. Nor was its collection of tapestries that draped the opposite wall. This display, drawn from holdings of works from across the Imperium, changed daily. A necessary ritual. The furniture underwent a similar change. There was always a large dining table, and seats for dozens. It was the individual identities of the items that altered.
Sometimes Tull took an active part in the selections of the day. Sometimes she left it to the serfs. What was important was the display. Any guest would see the riches of Imperial trade, and the vast reach of the Chartist fleet. Repeat guests witnessed ever greater wealth through perpetual variety. The more important the visitors, the more often they came, and the more they would be dizzied by the unending parade.
The symbolic, Tull understood, was not weaker than the real. The symbolic shaped the real. In the right hands, it was a weapon. Some of the other High Lords grasped the principle. Mesring certainly did. But his view was blinkered. He couldn’t see beyond the icons. He could only understand symbols that derived their potency through connection to the God-Emperor.
Then there was Lansung. A hopeless case. He could see the symbolic value in military action. He couldn’t imagine the reverse.
‘Gazing upon your good work?’ the Lord High Admiral asked.
Tull turned away from the window. She nodded at Georg Steinert, her majordomo. He withdrew.
‘I was,’ she said to Lansung.
‘Proud of yourself, aren’t you.’
‘Proud of us all. This is a great moment.’
He snorted. ‘Well, you can enjoy it without me.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I won’t have any part of the deployment.’
‘The Autocephalax Eternal…’
‘It will remain on station.’
‘You realise what that will look like.’ She was pleased that she answered without pause, as if his decision made no difference. Perhaps it didn’t.
‘Yes.’ The exhaustion in that single syllable was immense. At some point, Lansung appeared to have crossed the line between humiliation and apathy.
‘You’re a coward,’ Tull said, making sure Lansung understood what was heading his way.
‘I’m not here to posture,’ he said.
‘I know you’re not. I’m telling you simple truths. If you back out of the Proletarian Crusade, I’ll destroy you.’
‘Threats now.’
‘Just the truth. Like I said.’
Lansung shrugged. ‘Threats,’ he repeated. ‘Empty ones.’
‘Is that a dare?’ she asked.
He shook his head. ‘Just the truth, since that’s what we’re speaking. You won’t destroy me. The orks will take care of that when they arrive. I’ll outlive your fleet of fools, though. I notice that you’re not accompanying them.’
‘I’m not a military commander.’
‘No. You most certainly are not.’
She smiled. ‘I sense there is a point you’re making, Admiral.’
He gave her a hard, tired stare. ‘I’ve already made it.’ He turned to go.
‘You know I will destroy you,’ she said.
He stopped. ‘I know you can. But why? Out of spite?’
‘You know me better than that.’
‘I thought I did.’
‘You are sabotaging something too important.’
‘Bold words.’
‘The truth.’
He walked to the door. ‘As you say. But important to Terra or to you?’
‘Get out.’
She went back to the window. She heard Steinert show Lansung out. She looked towards the Fields of Winged Victory and took a breath. Lansung would have been pleased to see that it was unsteady.